‘Nuke trains’ with up to 30 Yars missiles rolling out from 2018 – Russian defense source

A BZhRK with a Molodets missile erected to launch position. Photo from wikipedia.org / Wikipedia

A Russian military source outlined the capabilities of Barguzin strategic missile train. The country may roll out five such disguised mobile launch platforms each carrying six RS-24 Yars missiles in five years.

A ‘nuclear train’ –
properly called BZhRK, short for ‘combat railway missile complex’
in Russian – is a mobile platform for transporting and launching
strategic nuclear missiles. Similarly to nuclear submarines, such
trains are hard to wipe out in a preemptive strike because of
their mobility and ability to be disguised as regular freight
trains.

The Soviet Union had 12 such nuclear trains, each carrying three
RT-23 Molodets (SS-24 Scalpel in NATO disambiguation) missiles,
but they were released from combat duty after Russia and the US
signed the START-2 treaty in 1993 and eventually decommissioned.

Last year the Russian military said that nuclear trains – which
are no longer banned under the New START treaty – would be
revived.

The move is meant to counter the US’s Conventional Prompt Global
Strike project, which would allow Pentagon to deliver precision
strikes with conventional weapons at any target in the world in
one hour.

Last week the head of Russia's Strategic Missile Force,
Lieutenant General Sergey Karakayev, revealed that the future
missile platform would be called Barguzin after the strong
eastern wind that blows over Lake Baikal.

Now a source in the Russian military, which preferred to remain
anonymous, has revealed some details of the weapon to Russian
news agencies.

Like its predecessor, Barguzin’s carriages carrying missiles
would be disguised as refrigerator cars. But since a Yars missile
weights roughly half of what a Molodets missile did, the cars
would not need reinforced wheel-sets to carry the load. This
would make the trains harder to identify from the ground.

The weight difference also means that a single nuclear train
would be able to carry more individual missiles. According to
designs of the Moscow Institute of Thermal Technology, the weapon
platform’s developer, each Barguzin would be able to tow up to
six Yars missiles, the source said.

The destructive
potential of the new platform would probably be smaller than that
of its predecessor however. Molodets missiles had 10 MIRVed
warheads with a total yield of 5.5 megatons. Yars reportedly has
four warheads with a total yield of between 0.4 and 1.2 megatons.
The more advanced Yars, however, is more accurate and has greater
range.

Organizationally, each train with its personnel would constitute
a single regiment of the Strategic Missile Force (RVSN).

“The BZhRKs Barguzin will be delivered to one of the RVSN
divisions organized into five regiments,” the source said.
“The timeline for finishing the development is 2018.”

The first Barguzin is likely to go into service in 2019, the
source said. The Russian military expects the nuclear trains to
remain in service until at least 2040.